


strange creatures

by Poetry



Category: Campaign (Podcast): Skyjacks
Genre: Future Fic, Other, Unresolved Emotional Tension, Yuletide Treat
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-18
Updated: 2020-12-18
Packaged: 2021-03-11 04:28:18
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,380
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28149102
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Poetry/pseuds/Poetry
Summary: Four moments from the future Travis and Gable build together after the oaths they swore to each other in Nordia.
Relationships: Gable/Travis Matagot
Comments: 8
Kudos: 14
Collections: Yuletide 2020





	strange creatures

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Culumacilinte](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Culumacilinte/gifts).



> this will get jossed immediately but do I care??? no!!!

**i. rabbit**

Jonnit runs to the curtained-off corner of the deck where Travis hangs his hammock, afire with excitement. He bursts through the curtain, just barely able to keep his voice down to a whisper so he doesn’t wake the rest of the deck: “Travis! Travis, I got this map in Nordia and I found —”

Travis isn’t alone in the hammock. It’s filled up by Gable, holding him as his long rabbit front teeth burst out of his human gums. Travis buries his face in Gable’s chest to muffle a scream of pain. Gable pets his hair and hushes him with low soothing sounds. It’s dawn, Jonnit realizes. He stayed up studying the map until dawn. “Sorry,” he says, backing away. “Bad timing — I didn’t —”

Travis rolls over within the restraining circle of Gable’s arm. His eyes are huge and liquid and black, and his rabbit mouth doesn’t fit his human face. “It’s fine,” he says wearily. “It’s nothing you haven’t seen before.”

Jonnit’s brain is still catching up to the situation. He blurts out, “Is this a thing now?”

Travis thrashes around in Gable’s grip as his ears stretch backward and outward. He grinds out, “Is _what_ a thing?”

At the same time, Gable says calmly, holding Travis firmly in place, “There’s no _thing_ , Jonnit, you can stay and tell Travis about your map.”

Jonnit backs away through the curtains. “You know what? I’mma come back in five minutes when you’re done. Bye! See you soon!”

“This isn’t a _thing_!” Travis yells after him, but Jonnit can’t help but notice, after, that Travis is never without Gable during his transformations unless he has to be.

**ii. coyote**

“See, Acaronne _is_ a real town,” Jonnit says, gesturing to the cluster of buildings around an unpaved road. “We have shops! Look, there’s a tannery!”

Travis wrinkles his snout. “I noticed. It stinks.”

“You know what?” Gable declares. “I think we should patronize the tannery. Show our support for Jonnit’s hometown.” They stride confidently toward the tannery.

Jonnit and Travis follow them, trailing behind. “They’re up to something,” Travis says, ears and tail low. “That’s their ‘I think I’m so clever’ voice. Except they’re not clever, they’re an idiot.”

“Hello!” Gable calls cheerily to Imra the tanner, who’s been on hart root tea since Jonnit last saw them, and looks great. They put down the cowhide they’ve been scrubbing and stare up at the giant stranger. Gable waves and smiles awkwardly. “Yes, hello, I would like to buy a collar for my dog, please.”

“What size dog — oh,” Imra says, eyes drawn to Travis as he flattens his ears back and growls at Gable. They say skeptically, “Are you sure that’s a dog? That sure looks like a coyote to me.”

Gable kneels next to Travis and makes a show of petting him. They say softly in his ear, “You’re a coyote during the day now. People can see you. And you know what will make people ask a lot fewer questions about a coyote walking around?”

“A dog collar,” Jonnit answers, smiling.

“That’s right,” Gable says, smiling even wider. “Plus, it’s funny.”

Travis growls and snaps, but even he can’t deny the logic. The people of Acaronne have been staring at him in fear all day. “Fine,” Travis huffs. “But this is just a temporary disguise. It’s not a thing.”

But when Gable buckles on the collar, Travis goes very quiet and still for a moment, and Jonnit thinks it might be a _thing_. “And it’s sexual,” says Spit, passing by, and Jonnit groans and flees into the tannery to ask Imra how Acaronne has been getting on without him.

**iii. snake**

Today, Travis decided it would be funny to wrap himself around Gable’s neck and pretend to be a necklace while whispering snarky comments in their ear. Jonnit hasn’t been able to hear anything Travis says, but from time to time he sees Gable twitch and hiss _shut up_ under their breath. He can see how badly Gable wants to strangle Travis, but they can’t get into an argument with their “snake necklace” in the middle of a busy city street when they’re trying to keep a low profile.

Jonnit tugs on Gable’s sleeve. “Incoming,” he says urgently. Gable spots the churchman and tugs down the front of their deep hood.

All the same, the churchman walks unerringly toward Gable. “What a lovely necklace you have,” he says with a sly smile, reaching toward Travis. Leaning up toward Gable, he says something in their ear that Jonnit can’t hear, and quicker than thought, Travis strikes. The churchman screams, stumbling back, Travis dangling from his hand with his fangs latched on tight. After a lot of yelling and thrashing, he ends up on the ground at Jonnit’s feet. Jonnit scoops up Travis and runs with Gable back toward the sky-ship docks.

“What happened?” Jonnit asks, as he leaps to clear a fruit stand that Gable knocked over in front of him. “What did he say to Gable that got you all bitey?”

“Gable has been annoying me for over 200 years,” Travis yells over all the chaos in their wake. “Anyone else who wants to kill them has to _get in line_!”

**iv. raven**

Gable spreads an extradimensional suggestion of wings and says plaintively, “Are we sure I have enough feathers for this?”

“If you collect any more, you’ll have more feathers than brains,” Travis says. The wind whips past the open entrance of the birdcage. He has to hold on tight to the edge.

“You got this, Gable,” Jonnit says from behind them. “And if you fall, Metatron’ll catch you!”

“I don’t remember how to do this,” Gable says. “Just having part of my wings back isn’t enough. Baby birds aren’t born knowing how to fly. I once saw a fledgling fall out of the tree to the street and get squished by a carriage. That’s me. I’m a clumsy baby bird.”

That’s a perfect opening for a mean joke, and Travis deserves a sainthood for passing it up. But pass it up he will, because Gable is looking out at the open sky genuinely frightened, in a way they so rarely are. When Gable got all pathetic like this, it fell to Travis to rescue them. He had done it before. “Good thing you have a papa bird to show you how, then. Watch.” He spreads his wings and tail. “Wait until you have a tailwind. You’ll feel it lift your back feathers. You tilt forward, you push off with your legs, and _then_ you beat your wings downward.” He flexes his legs, tilts down toward the abyss of the sky, and takes off. He feels a great disturbance of air behind him, and knows that Gable has taken a leap of faith and followed him. Jonnit’s whoop of excitement confirms it, and Travis turns around in the air to get a good look.

Gable is an impossible thing in the air. Their wings look the same way that the rest of their body once had on the day Travis found Gable washed up on the beach: disjointed, unreal, disappearing in the corner of his eye. All the same, they’re _flying_ , terror in their eyes giving way to wonder as their wings catch the wind. Behind them, on the ship, Jonnit pumps his fist in triumph, while above decks, Slam points and shouts to his crewmates. “I’m doing it,” Gable calls excitedly to Travis. “Travis, I’m doing it!”

“You had a good teacher,” Travis shouts back. “Follow me!”

On a day like today, with the golden autumn sun beating down on a red desert below them, Travis knows what he’ll find, and he does: a column of warm air that carries him up and up until even the Uhuru and its blazing red sails becomes just another splash of color in the desert. Gable rises alongside him on the thermal, sun on their face, laughing in light. This is why Travis only feels the need to kiss Gable once in a long while, in the heat of battle or the heat of something else: there are so many ways for them to keep their oath to stay together, and he thinks that this one might be his new favorite.


End file.
